New name for "SpinCo," the spinoff created by Comcast/TWC merger.

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"GreatLand Connections" is the United States' next cable company, potentially coming to 2.5 million subscribers currently served by Comcast in 11 states.

Comcast decided to spin off part of its territory to help persuade US regulators to approve its acquisition of Time Warner Cable and a related transaction with Charter. Until today, the new company had been referred to generically as "SpinCo" or "Midwest Cable LLC," but now it has an official name.

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"GreatLand Connections Inc., a new, independent, publicly-traded company, will own and operate former Comcast systems serving approximately 2.5 million customers across the Midwest and Southeast," Comcast wrote. "At its inception, it is expected to be the fifth largest cable company in the United States."

GreatLand's customer areas will be in Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Tennessee, Virginia, and Wisconsin. If Comcast can't get approval for the TWC merger, the customers would remain with Comcast. Separately, Charter would get 1.4 million TWC customers in exchange for $7.3 billion if the merger is approved.

Comcast shareholders, but not Comcast itself, would own 67 percent of GreatLand Connections. Charter would own the other third through a holding company.

Left unsettled is whether GreatLand will continue Comcast's Internet Essentials program, which provides $10-per-month Internet access to low-income families. Comcast created this program in order to secure approval of its NBCUniversal acquisition in 2011. The requirement expired in June 2014, but Comcast is voluntarily continuing it. Comcast also offered to extend Internet Essentials to TWC subscriber areas if the merger is approved, but Comcast has said GreatLand will not be obligated to offer the cheap service.

Comcast and Time Warner Cable are the two largest cable companies in the US with 22.5 million and 11.2 million pay-TV customers, respectively. Charter has 4.3 million, and Cablevision has 2.8 million. Cox has six million total residential and business customers, but it's a private company and has not said how many of those subscribe to pay-TV.

Promoted Comments

When an entity can spin off the unprofitable part that it doesn't want, and that chaff is the fifth largest cable company in the US, you know that you've allowed too much consolidation and monopolization.